


Three Ghosts

by a_secondhand_sorrow



Category: Dear Evan Hansen - Pasek & Paul/Levenson
Genre: BandTrees, F/M, Originally Posted on Tumblr, Suicide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-20
Updated: 2019-02-20
Packaged: 2019-11-01 11:16:05
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,314
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17866238
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/a_secondhand_sorrow/pseuds/a_secondhand_sorrow
Summary: Now, she’d toss and turn all night until eventually exhaustion took over, forcing the echoing voices inside of her head to silence. Ironically, that was her favorite time-when she was forced to have a clear mind as her body finally couldn’t handle any thoughts. The hours before, however, were the worst. With only dark and silence, she was forced to confront the angry, taunting voice in her mind, and the little boy that always looked so damn sad, and the anxious smile that seemed to be the image her brain most reverted to.***(or: Zoe Murphy’s fall from grace)





	Three Ghosts

**Author's Note:**

> Here’s more imported from tumblr! I love Zoe Murphy a lot if you can’t tell.

These days, sleep was impossible _._ Not that it was ever easy, with constant tension in the air so thick she sometimes felt as though she’d choke on it if she wasn’t careful enough.

(Of course, there were those months she’d slept well. But that was long gone, and to think of those now would be the source of more sleeplessness.)

Now, she’d toss and turn all night until eventually exhaustion took over, forcing the echoing voices inside of her head to silence. Ironically, that was her favorite time-when she was forced to have a clear mind as her body finally couldn’t handle any thoughts. The hours before, however, were the worst. With only dark and silence, she was forced to confront the angry, taunting voice in her mind, and the little boy that always looked so damn sad, and the anxious smile that seemed to be the image her brain most reverted to.

But in the early hours of morning, all of that would disappear, if only for a few minutes before the blaring alarm clock shook her out of her peaceful haze, and the cycle would begin again.

***

Sometimes, the taunting voice was the worst _._

_Oh, you’re feeling a little tired? Is it because you’re guilty? You’re guilty now? For what, Zoe? Why would you be fucking guilty, huh, Zoe? Is it because I’m dead? Or you prefer it that way, instead of wishing I was here? Or is it because you trusted someone else. Someone who hurt you, tore you down. Is that why you’re guilty, Zo? Not for little ol’ me. Never for me, Zo, is that right?_

“Shut UP!” she’d scream, tearing at her hair, trying to do something, anything to quiet the voice _._

How ironic to have your dead abusive brother’s voice haunt you at all hours, right? Connor’s voice was a backdrop to Zoe’s life. She shouldn’t have been surprised. Connor was the sun which the Murphy family orbited around. Her whole life had been controlled by his needs and his problems. Of course that wouldn’t change after he killed himself.

The worst part was that he said the things she knew, but hurt the most to acknowledge.

_Oh, what’s wrong, little Zo? Can’t face the fact you loved a liar?_

That night, she stole her mother’s sleeping pills.

***

School was just another obstacle.

Classes were okay. She mostly let the teacher’s voices take over her head and give her a short reprieve from Connor’s constant harassment.

Sometimes, when her mind truly wandered, she’d begin to doodle stars on the cuffs of her jeans.

She always caught herself before she got too far.

Hallways between classes were the worst _._

Somehow, knowing that everyone in this crowd knew her as the dead kid’s sister made the crowd feel angrier, more violent.

Sometimes, she thought about which ones in it had turned on her when the ‘suicide note’ was released. Which one had called her a stuck up bitch? Which one had given away her phone number?

And there was Connor’s face, constantly staring her down from the Connor Project posters lining every wall. Even though his was the only face on the posters, she could silently feel another one, lurking beneath the surface, reminding her of her mistakes.

_Can’t even look at your own brother, huh, Zo?_

_Or is it someone else you’re avoiding?_

It wasn’t like she had any friends left, anyway, to walk the halls with. They’d all left her after the “suicide note” came out, the ones that were left after-after she made simultaneously the best and worst decision of her life. A few had stuck with her through it all, and they constantly tried to break down her walls. After enough trying, they’d learned that Zoe needed space. She didn’t do anything to refute this, although she desperately wanted human contact.

They couldn’t stay around her, even if they wanted to. She wouldn’t allow them. How could she, when she killed everything she touched?  
So she mostly walked the halls a shell of her former self, sometimes with a mix of her favorite songs or some ‘80s rock blaring in her earbuds in the hope that it would drown out the constant torrent of voices beating her down. Sometimes it worked. Mostly it didn’t.

Jazz band helped a little. When she played the guitar, her problems slipped away a little, forced out the voices in her head. Sometimes she’d begin to smile, before a voice piped up in her head, reminding her of the time when someone had called that exact smile subtle and perfect and real. Like she was in on some secret that she was letting you into, just by smiling.

She didn’t enjoy being in on this secret.

_***_

Situated alone in her room, Zoe lapsed back into herself. Even though her mother had attempted to get Zoe to talk to her, she’d brushed Cynthia off quickly and cleanly, disconnecting herself immediately.

It was then her phone began to ring.

That’d happened for hours on end, she remembered, after the suicide note. She’d started off by replying with something quick and rude.

_Have fun with your miserable life, bye._

But eventually, she’d just give up. She’d let the voices rant and scream about how she killed Connor, how she was the problem. She could have saved him if she’d tried.

She found it hard not to believe them.

Larry and Cynthia had insisted she get her number changed. Twice. On this line, she’d only gotten one phone call, one she didn’t even tell her parents about. It was easier to not tell them. If she told them, they would’ve freaked out again.

All Zoe wanted was peace.

But something inside of her compelled her to pick up the phone with a standard “hello?”

Her own voice surprised her. She’d barely listened to it, recently. It was as though she was a stranger in her own body, her voice reverberating through her empty brain, startling her to listening.

And the person on the other line started immediately. They weren’t angry in tone. They were condescending.

They told her that she clearly had no idea what her brother was going through, how she hadn’t attempted to understand. That if she had gotten off of her ass and realized he was suffering, he would be here. That if she hadn’t been such an awful sister, he would be here.

Something in the last line made her snap.

She yelled like she couldn’t remember yelling before. Every emotion that she’d felt without really feeling was balled up in her chest, and the only thing she could think to do was scream it all out at this person who felt they had a right to berate her, to blame her for something they knew nothing about.

She started controlled. “I spent every goddamn night sleeping outside of Connor’s door for a year because he would fight with my mother and refuse to let me into his room. Until I turned twelve, I did this every night, begging him to let me in, to talk to me. He wouldn’t even deign me with a response. When I turned thirteen, I started staying up, waiting for him to come home, worrying to the point I’d almost throw up. All he’d do when he came in at three or four am was threaten to kill me if I told our parents.”

She could feel herself getting louder. She didn’t care.

“When I turned fourteen, he was already hooked on pot and whatever other shit he did! When I tried to intervene, he threw a burning joint at me!”

Years of trying. Years of pain.

“How much did you want me to put up with? How many years of abuse? How many days as his personal punching bag? How many days of holding my tounge, waiting for him to tire out? How many sleepless nights, how many panic attacks? How much was I supposed to do?”

She’s crying. She’s not sure when she started.

“How was I supposed to help him, when he wouldn’t help himself? How?”

Zoe choked a little.

_When I couldn’t even help myself?_

A little voice at the back of her head piped up. Maybe you should have done more. Been a better sister. Realized he was suffering inside of his own head.

 _“_ Does that mean he could make me suffer?” she shouted, suddenly addressing the person on the other line again, tears building up once again. “Was I responsible for his whole life, when he wouldn’t let me live?”

The voice has started speaking on the phone again. “Because he was the monster!” Or had the voice been inside of her own head? “He was the monster!”

It didn’t matter where the voice was, anymore. All that mattered was the fact that she was sliding, sliding, sliding to the ground.

“Or am I the monster?” Zoe whispered, feeling shards of glass prick her fingertips. She had shattered her phone, the broken glass catching light along the floor, creating odd patterns. Almost small rainbows finding their way across the ground, surrounding her in irony. Pain complimenting _beauty._

 _That’s wasn’t always me, you know, Zo._ The cruel voice of Connor morphed into a sweeter voice. A little boy.

_Once, I was good. Maybe you changed that._

_“_ Shut up,” she tried to shout, her hoarse voice _only allowing a half hearted wheeze._

_You could’ve fixed me, Zoe._

Zoe sat, shattered glass around her, tears streaming down her face and blood drawn from her finger _._

 _I was too broken, anyway,_ she wanted to say _. Far too broken to fix you._

_***_

Of course, Cynthia had heard the commotion. For once, no questions were asked, simply sympathetic, probing looks as she cleaned up the glass and bandaged Zoe’s fingers. She couldn’t enjoy getting off easy.

 _You find your only daughter having a mental breakdown amongst a shattered phone and this is how you fucking react_?

For once, the voice wasn’t criticizing her.

 _Ask me questions!_ She wanted to shout. _Take me to a thousand doctors! Actually show that you care about me, not just Connor, who’s dead!_

Instead, Zoe did nothing, gingerly curling her fingers over in their bandages. She could hear her mother start behind her as she bounded back up the stairs.

“Zoe-“

Cynthia has missed that opportunity.

With an odd sense of detachment, Zoe slammed the door behind her and stopped dead in her tracks when she saw which room she was in.

AKA, most definitely not hers.

Or her parents’.

Or the guest room.

_Can’t stand to be in my room, Zoe? Can’t face the fact that your monster lived in here?_

Something inside of her shifted, just slightly, enough to uncover a sliver of a wound she’d hidden _._

_Hm, no. That’s what I thought. With all your care, that never extended to me, huh? Always another fucking person, not me. The golden child, forever and always. You’d care about Evan Hansen, who lied to your face for months, tore Mom and Dad apart, tore my memory apart, tore you apa-_

Too late for that talk, isn’t it, hm, Connor?

_***_

_she remembered the first time she really talked to him._

_they were in his room-no, not his room, Connor’s room-and he really opened up for the first time, got past that anxious, stuttering façade. and something struck her, right there and then-_

_ohnonononodontfalldownthisrabbitholedontspiraldownthisdirectionstopstopstopstop-_

_and Connor was alive that day, truly alive, not in those times when he screamed and broke things-or got so high Zoe had to check his pulse to make sure he was alive-or decided to terrorize some random kids at school because they breathed funny-_

_and Zoe knew he was hurting, hurting so bad inside of his own head. and Zoe knew she was hurting, too. hurting but unable to show it.  
because the Murphys were perfect, weren’t they? at least they were supposed to be. photo albums full of touched up photos, neatly trimmed hedges, white trimmed mini mansion. perfect children. perfect life. perfect… everything._

_someone had to be that, right? when Connor became a pothead and Larry pulled away and Cynthia threw herself into any activity that provided a moment of distraction. someone had to smile through the pain in their own heads, smile even though they were falling apart at the seams. smile when med after med failed, when no one noticed the pain of his sister, assumed she could handle neglect for years as Connor imploded, assumed she was better off alone to be her perfect self. not popular, or the prettiest, or the smartest. but in some way perfect. the Murphy standard._

_she tried to be perfect, because she could be nothing less._

_welllookwherethatfuckinggotyounowyourejustagoddamnmess-_

_at first, he was a distraction. she didn’t know him; but he brought her brother back, and made her feel again, feel something other than pain and sorrow. but distraction morphed into genuine interest, and interest morphed into something else, as the days went on. something else when his deep brown eyes met hers, his laugh filled her ears, his lips grazed hers, his fingers ghosted over her skin. infatuation turned to love, and she began to heal from sixteen years of fear and pain.  
it was stupid of her to think it could ever get better, it could ever last. she was stuck with her brokenness, cursed to carry it to the end of time. the only outs had already been stolen by Connor. doctors. drugs. death._

_would she always get his hand-me-downs that could never fit?_

_***_

In the end, she was left to pick up the pieces.

To mourn her brother and to never forgive him. To pull her parents together and set them to sink or swim. To heal the fissures in her mind, and to make sure they stayed sealed. To forgive and remember.

To carry on, with the three ghosts beside her.

**Author's Note:**

> Talk to me on tumblr @itstrulyastrangerthing or my writing sideblog @a-secondhand-sorrow


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